My backpacking began in 1999. I have hiked rainforests in Hawaii, Costa Rica, and Puerto Rico, on glaciers in New Zealand and Iceland, 14ers in Colorado and Death Valley's deserts. I hike or snowshoe 6-8 miles (10 km-13 km) 2-3 times weekly in Pontiac Lake Recreation Area, with other day-long hikes on various SE Michigan trails. I also hike in Colorado and am relocating there, which will increase my hiking time and trail variety tremendously.

Features: "Merino wool fibers give this comfortable long sleeve the ability to manage moisture and dry quickly. Active styling makes it feel more like a comfortable cotton shirt than a technical piece. The odor neutralization allows you to wear it for days on end without developing a permanent stench.

The arrival of the Outdoor Research M's Sequence LS Tee brought no surprises in its appearance as it looks just like the graphic on the OR website. "Barley" is a pleasantly neutral beige color and the Tee is highlighted with a dark brown banded 1 in (2.5 cm) crew neck collar.

There is a raised rubber-like "barley-colored" OR logo in the center front chest area and a very small fabric OR label on the front right hemline. The Sequence LS Tee is a very nice looking shirt I can wear in town as well as on the mountain.

Thanks to Outdoor Research's accurate website size chart, my choice of the Sequence LS Tee in my usual size "L", proved a good fit. The Tee is snug, but not too snug - just the way I like my tees. The length is very generous, ending about mid-hip. I was pleased to find that I can tuck the Tee inside my pants, wave my arms around over my head, bend down etc., without the Tee becoming un-tucked. The raglan sleeves add to the comfort factor with no shoulder seam to be ground into my skin under the weight of a pack and more room with less bulk in the underarm. The sleeve length, however, is longer than I would like. The hem comes down to just about mid-thumb and the sleeves are not very wide. I can push the sleeves up a bit (mid-forearm), but not above my elbow. The side seams taper a bit towards the front of the Tee for a more athletic fit, leaving the back of the Tee wider than the front. The hemline is straight and finished so it can be worn outside my pants.

The polyester/wool blend material of the OR M's Sequence LS Tee is very light an comfortable. It feels very much like a fine knit cotton. The Tee "slides" on easily. There is none of the scratchiness of some wool blends I've had.

OR thoughtfully used a stamped size label on the interior back neck of the Tee. This label also indicates that the Tee was made in China. The English/French/International symbols care and content label is placed on the front right seam near the hem. Care instructions are: "Machine wash, cold. Do Not bleach. Iron, Low. Do Not Dryclean. Tumble Dry. Low." There is also a small Dri-Release®/FreshGuard® labeled fabric tag just next to the care instructions tag.

Another nice touch OR added is a taped interior seam at the back neckline of the crew neck collar. The tape covers the double stitched seam so there is a minimum of contact with a possible irritant. Nice!

A thorough inspection indicated that the OR M's Sequence LS Tee was manufactured with quality. There are no snags or runs in the body of the material.

All seams are double stitched and sewn with an overlapping stitch to prevent ragged edges and unraveling. All seams lay flat. I could find no loose or uneven stitches. No loose threads were unraveling. The Sequence Tee is ready to go out and hit the trails!

I've worn the Outdoor Research Sequence M's Tee over the past 2 months a total of over 40 days. I've hiked over 80 mi (129 km) in both winter weather and spring-like bright sun in Colorado. The treks included snowshoeing in 4 ft (1 m) of powder for 5 mi (8 km) at Rocky Mountain National Park and numerous miles (kilometers) of bushwhacking in the rough terrain of the Cooper Mountain range each day for a week in November, a week in December 2006, plus 18 days in January 2007.

When the temp was below 32 F (0 C) I was layered with a Capilene short sleeve T, a silk long sleeve pullover, the OR Sequence Tee, a lightweight quilted nylon layer, a wind shirt and a lightweight ski jacket. This combo kept me warm down to 0 F (-18 C) with brisk winds of up to 30 mph (48 kph). This lightweight layering was made easier by using the OR Sequence Tee as a lower layer.

That's the nice part of layering in a place where the temp changes rapidly. As the temp dropped it was easy to pull on other layers to keep up with the change without sweating. When the weather reached up to 50 F (10 C), I was very comfortable with just my Capilene T and a lightweight silk long-sleeve pullover under the OR Sequence Tee.

Because I now layer with such high-tech clothing, I do not sweat a lot. Until I learned about new fabrics and how to use them, I, like many new hikers, used to bulk up with heavy wool sweaters, cotton shirts, and heavy coats. With products like the OR Sequence Tee, lightweight layering takes me comfortably into very cold weather conditions with a great deal of flexibility for movement.

The OR Sequence Tee is also very plush with a fine weave, so additional layers slide smoothly on over the Tee.

It is an attractive Tee, by the way. With its darker collar rim and emblem, it sort of resembles a Star Trek uniform, but it looks very nice.

The sleeves on the OR Sequence Tee are a little longer than I like them to be. I find myself tucking them up under my top layers. None of the other layers I wear are that long, so I'm not sure if I have short arms or the size scaling for arms is off and is a design flaw.

I never NEEDED to wash the OR Sequence Tee after wearing it for as long as 15 days in January for as long as 14 hours per day. It did not smell or hold body odor even though I was 3 days between showers. It didn't smell like roses, but it was neutral, and at the end of 15 days, it was just kind of "dusty" smelling. I've only washed the OR Sequence Tee 3 times in the past 2 months.

I washed the OR Sequence Tee by hand in cold water with plain liquid dish washing soap. Yes, I got dirty water, but it rinsed out well and dried out by morning when just hung to dry (I was in an area where the humidity is usually in the 40% range). I was able to wear the shirt again the next day.

I've worn the OR Sequence Tee shirt now for four months on extended hikes and while working in the field. It's been worn at temperatures from 10 F (-12 C) in freezing rain and snow to 65 F (18 C) in bright sunshine.

There has been no sign of wear at all in the hundreds of hours of use and after multiple washings. Heck, I've washed this T by hand with dishwashing soap as well as in the laundry machine ... when I had to, and it was not that often. This shirt does not "stink up" like others I have had. It stays odor free for days. It gets that slight sandy, dusty smell (and I wear this mostly under desert hiking and working conditions where there is a lot of blowing sand), but it has never gotten a body odor smell.

There is no evidence of pilling, loose stitches or snags after all these months. Nor has the tee lost its shape by stretching out or shrinking.

The sleeves are longer than my 30 in (76 cm) arm length. They are 33 in (84 cm) long, which means I have to deal with about 3 in (8 cm) of extra length. So I find myself tucking the extra length up under my fleece or jacket or reaching under my shoulder and pulling the sleeve up. It's not a major issue, but the sleeve length is set up for a longer arm.

It's an extremely comfortable shirt, works well with whatever I use under or over it, and its only annoyance is the sleeve length. I've worn it with two layers underneath (a Capilene tee and a silk long sleeve tee) and many layers above (pull over cottons, fleece pullovers, wind jackets, shells). It'll be one of my favorite layers for sure because it is so comfortable and because I can go for several days without washing it.

This concludes my Test Series Report on Outdoor Research's M's Sequence LS Tee. Thank you to Outdoor Research and BGT for the opportunity to test the OR M's Sequence LS Tee.

Product tested and reviewed in each Formal Test Report has been provided free of charge by the manufacturer to BackpackGearTest.org. Upon completion of the Test Series the writer is permitted to keep the product. Owner Reviews are based on product owned by the reviewer personally unless otherwise noted.